


Crying Wolf

by FallenAutte



Category: Lego Ninjago
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jayngst, Kidnapping, M/M, Mental Torture, Multi, Neglect, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Overstimulation, Self Harm, Whump, and it's just the word, masturbation is mentioned like once
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2020-12-22 21:34:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21083432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FallenAutte/pseuds/FallenAutte
Summary: Jay gets himself into trouble, but due to having a reputation for worrying about nothing, his team brushes off his concerns. That is, until he disappears.





	1. Regret

It’s been three weeks, and Jay Walker is nowhere to be found.

The ninja team have been searching the entire time for him, all the while a dark cloud hangs over their heads.

He had _warned_ them. They try not to think about how they had ignored his concerns. They called him silly, they called him paranoid, and they accused him of imagining the shadows that followed him. The day of his disappearance, he claimed to feel sick and didn’t want to leave the _Bounty_ but they made him leave anyway. It makes them feel stupid, it makes them feel worthless, and it makes them feel like bad friends. Their easy dismissal of their partner’s problem ended with his disappearance and now they have no idea where he is or if he’s okay or if he’s even _alive_. Even Lloyd is starting to look at the situation with a bleak mindset. Even _Lloyd Garmadon_, the most determined and downright _stubborn _person any of the ninja have ever known, is starting to give up.

What’s worse, is that they all still have a job to do. They can’t take time away from their job of protecting Ninjago to find their friend. If something comes up while they are searching, they just have to drop everything and jump into action where they are needed in the moment. It makes their life difficult, and even more stressful. Too stressful.

Cole seems to be taking it the hardest. As Jay’s best friend, he feels most responsible for not keeping a closer eye on him. It doesn’t help that they had a big fight the night before Jay’s disappearance, and they hadn’t truly had a chance to make up before he was gone. It eats away at Cole’s heart and soul. What if Jay is dead and died thinking that Cole hates him? He can’t bear that thought and possibility. He’s been eating far more as a vent for his stress, and the behavior doesn’t show any signs of letting up any time soon.

They’re all losing their hope.

**~** **♡** **~**

“Have you got _any_ leads? Have the police got any?”

“None, still…” Kai presses his forehead into his palms and tugs at his own hair. The tips of the chocolate strands flicker as weak embers but never ignite to anything more. He’s frustrated, he’s angry, but he’s also scared and tired. Cole can only watch wearily as he approaches from the edge of the _Destiny’s Bounty _deck.

They had taken the night shift together, and are using this time to continue their search for their missing friend. Jay had disappeared weeks ago with hardly a trace and the entire team can’t help but blame themselves. “If only we had-“

“I know, Kai,” Cole sighs, cutting his friend off with a weak and quiet voice. He’d heard the groan a thousand times. “We should have listened to him.”

“We should have kept an eye on him,” comes the huff, and Kai leans back in the chair he had pulled onto the deck with the collapsible table that is covered with the weighed down scraps of paper with notes and scribbles that all seems meaningless from a glance. Taking a closer inspection doesn’t help much, either, as none of the points and clues highlighted on the papers seem to tie together unless they’re the same point branded differently. “He wasn’t feeling good, whether he was actually sick or not we shouldn’t have let him out of our sight.”

“You say that as if I don’t know that.” Now it’s Cole’s turn to hang his head in his hands; he takes the other seat that Kai had left next to his own and leans his elbows on the table, which crumples some of the useless notes under his arm and head weight. “We shouldn’t have even forced him off the ship. We were all selfish, and look where it got us. Look where it got Jay.”

A surge of anger envelops Kai and he picks up a paperweight from the table – a normal rock with an entirely flat side that Jay had picked up from the First Realm and somehow dragged back with them – and throws it away with a scream that’s barely held back. The rock hits the _Bounty _railing before bouncing over the edge. “We’ve swept all of Ninjago! We’ve even checked the Lost City of Ouroboros and flown over every inch of the Dark Island and we’ve gotten **_nothing!_**”

**~** **♡** **~**

It’s been weeks, and he’s lost hope of ever being found. Truth be told, he’s lost track of the time, and for all he knows it could have been weeks or months at this point – he hardly cares. He’s certain that his “friends” don’t care about him: why would they? He’s just annoying and stupid and weak, things that his teammates have admitted to countless times. Why would they search for him? It hurts, but he knows it’s the bitter truth.

The dim room’s walls are padded in something soft, and he’s sure that they’re fixed to vingestone beyond it. He’s given up trying to spark electricity between his hands – even just to see with – ages ago. The only irregularity in the environment is a small section in the corner with a makeshift bathroom: a toilet that doesn’t flush and a mockup shower that doesn’t run hot water and shuts off after five minutes and can only be used once every two days. He never bothers using the shower, and fully ignores the tiny packets of liquid body soap that is provided with it. In another corner is a cot with a ragged blanket that looks like it would tear with the slightest tension placed onto the fabric. The floor and walls are softer than the cot, so he doesn’t bother using it. He only takes the blanket to tear at. Other than this, the room is bland.

The most amount of change in his environment that he gets is the rise of the slit in the bottom of the door that allows food and water to be slid into his cell. But even the scheduling of this seems constant, so he’s numbed himself to it. He’s tried to put his hands under the slit a few times, but it seems to be shut tightly from the other side. He succeeded once, to shove his hands under when his food was being slid into the room, but a heavy boot crushed his fingers and shoved his hand back into the room. He hasn’t tried it again. The person – or people, or _things_ – who leave him food never speak. He is constantly in the quiet with no stimulation of any sort, and it’s just as maddening as it sounds like it would be. With nothing to do as time blends together, he sleeps. It feels like he sleeps all day, and sometimes he’ll wake up to multiple meals at the door. He’s lucky whoever has captured him seems to care about his physical health. His mental health is far less of a priority. In fact, it almost seems like they’re purposefully attempting to damage his mental health. No, they’re _definitely _attempting to damage it. But… there’s nothing he can do, so he just sleeps.

Eventually, sleeping grows tiring, so he starts to eat the food he’s saved from when he was sleeping, food he hadn’t been able to eat because of his sleeping, and he just eats. He’s still getting more food twice a day (or so he assumes), so he hardly has time to run out, so he feels like he’s constantly eating until he either throws up or can only lie in pain for a while. It’s unhealthy, but he has nothing better to do. There’s nothing he can do, so he just eats. But of course, he runs out of food to graze on eventually, so he’s left with nothing to do. Sleeping lost its charm and he doesn’t have a food supply.

With nothing left to do, he eventually resorts to using his own body to stimulate himself. Of course, with his mind deteriorating slowly he doesn’t have much common sense about him. The room is padded and numb so he can’t use the walls or floor to stimulate himself so he uses his uncuffed hands. He scratches, and bites and scratches some more until he bites his fingernails off. He uses the cheap plastic utensils left with his food to scratch some more until they break, and then he uses the plastic shards to scratch until he bleeds. There is so much red staining the – presumably white – fabric that pads his dark room, from the blood that he spills from himself in an attempt to feel something, to entertain himself, to keep him from going mad. It does little to actually help, but the pain is distracting at least. But like everything else, he eventually goes numb to this.

He tries other things, too, just to feel and stimulate. He tries starving, but can hardly go more than three days before caving in and eating the saved up food until he throws up, and then eating some more. He tries talking to himself, and for a while that works until his conversations start repeating or droning to his own ears. He tries counting, tapping his arms, masturbating, and playing memory games with himself. Nothing seems to stimulate him for long and he grows numb to it all.

Sometimes someone will come into the room to clean up. Usually it’s when he’s asleep, and he’ll wake up in another room tied up, blindfolded and gagged with new injuries and a headache. He can feel the presence of someone else in the room but they never speak and he can’t even hear them breathe. He comes to the conclusion that his captors aren’t human, or even alive, but they don’t have the distinctive clatter of bones that the skulkin produce with their movement either. Their footsteps don’t make noise, but he supposes that could have to do with the material of the floor. When he’s brought back to the room, he’s hit over the head and knocked unconscious so he doesn’t actually know what goes on during the travel. He wakes back up in the same room that now has a medical smell to it, almost like bleach and rubbing alcohol. The red stains are still in the fabric but they’re far faded and brown. The smell gives him a headache and he can’t sleep. He picks at the scabs that form along his arms and tears at his own clothes – they’ve already been reduced to blue rags at this point.

**~** **♡** **~**

The frantic call to the bridge by Zane and Nya immediately summons everyone on the _Destiny's_ _Bounty_, even Wu, who had been meditating in his room not a moment before, makes an appearance alongside his pupils. A thick atmosphere hangs over the team and time seems to slow for everyone.

"You've got something?" Cole asks, hopeful yet solemn, because surely the tone in Nya's voice over the intercom can't mean anything good.

"We have, but I do not think you will like it." With this, Zane's eyes light up and a projection is brought up to the wall behind the center console. On the wall shows a live feed of a website nobody on the team had ever heard of, with pale yellow forum posts and a dark background. A red, stylized logo in the top corner reads _The Red Forums_.

"Is this some kind of dark web bullshit-?"

"Precisely. This site in particular is for sharing pictures, video, audio, and textual retellings of heinous crimes committed by its anonymous user base. It uses highly encrypted data to prevent the tracking and reprimanding of such deeds." A heavy pit forms in all the ninjas' stomachs at once. Lloyd is the first to speak after many moments of aching silence, though his shaking voice easily betrays his fear.

"Are you saying that… something happened to Jay and was put onto this site?" A nod from Nya confirms the horrible suspicion, and she points out a long, untidy and conspicuous link in the head forum post that Zane's projection is focused on. Before the link is opened, Lloyd reads aloud: "I managed to snag this kid a couple of months ago and have been enjoying the view as he deteriorates in total isolation…" His voice trails away by the end of the post, and his hesitation to order Zane to open the link gives everyone a plentiful amount of time to allow the words and the _dread _to settle in.

Nobody can handle the tension and the silence, but it ends up being Kai who prompts the nindroid to continue. The link opens, and it opens to a new site within Zane’s internal internet browser. This new website is entirely black with the exception of few red menu buttons at the top, but otherwise the main focus is the center of the screen. It appears to be a live stream. The camera records in a green night vision and displays a temperature reading and time stamp in the lower right corner of the screen. A shoddy bed is one corner, and a small "bathroom" is in another, and a door place in a third corner. The camera must be in a fourth corner where it looks down on the room from. However, the room is not empty of life. Curled against the wall between the cot and the door is a sleeping form, clutching tightly to a thin and ragged blanket around their shivering body. The temperature is 65° Fahrenheit, a level that most people would find comfortable or even warm, except for…

“Jay…” Nya and Zane had already seen the stream, and Zane being the projector for it means he can’t react without interrupting the image, so their reactions are miniscule, but there is still fear and pain in Nya's eyes. Everyone else makes an audible reaction. Cole - who uttered their lost friend’s name with a voice so full of grief and regret - tenses his muscles and clenches his jaw to prevent himself from reacting any more. After a few minutes of just watching with little changing, he slowly relaxes enough to pry a question from himself: “What’s this site about? Can we track this?”

Zane’s response is immediate and to the point. It’s likely he may have toggled his emotion switch before turning on the stream, which is entirely understandable considering the nature of the situation. “Technically, this site is not as secure as the forum site, but any attempt to trace the streamer’s IP address turns up with false or nonexistent numbers. They may be using a VPN or data encryption tool of some sort.”

A loud curse explodes from Kai, and the profanity is swiftly followed by the dull sound of a fist colliding with the wooden wall of the _Bounty_. “Fucken hell! We know where he is but not _where _he is and we can’t do shit about it!”

“I have been recording the stream since we started watching,” Zane reassures. It doesn’t do much to help. “I will continue to record so if anything happens we will be able to look back on it and analyze. It may give more information to us. I will also alert the police to the forum and streaming site so they may monitor as well.” Once he finishes speaking, Zane’s eyes dim down and the projection on the wall vanishes.

“I think we all should get some rest,” Nya says softly, the shaking of her voice hardly noticeable. “It would do us good to calm down so we can think rationally from here on out.” Lloyd nods in agreement, which is then followed by echoed hums of approval from the others.

“Zane,” Wu says, making his voice known for the first time in this meeting. “If you need it, you are free from training until we find out more about Jay’s situation. Your focus is needed there most of all.”

“Thank you, sensei.”

“The rest of you will be training more in the weeks to come. We must be ready more than ever. The path from here to finding Jay may very well be unpredictable.”

Even though Kai groans and Cole shuffles his feet in discomfort, they both utter “Yes, sensei,” along with Nya and Lloyd.

They have a long and painful stretch of time ahead of them.


	2. Something

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Something finally seems to be looking up for the ninja in their search for their friend. It isn't much, but it's something.

For the first time since Zane had been monitoring the stream for days, something finally happens. A large figure pushes open the heavy metal door of the cell and shoves the untouched trays of food to the side with a foot to clear a walk space. He carries a bag over his shoulder and has a hood pulled up to obscure his face, but otherwise there isn’t much of anything that stands out about him in the dim lighting of the room, not even with the night vision filter of the camera. The man’s large feet shuffle over the padded floor and approach Jay’s curled body, but recoils with a husky curse when the shivering mass shifts and suddenly backs away from him. He’s quick to grab hold of Jay’s ankle and pull him close enough to hit over the head harshly with an unknown object clutched tightly in his hand. The boy’s scream is cut short as he slumps over, unconscious, with a dark streak beginning to drip from his eyebrow and stain his face.

The man wastes no time and flips Jay over, pulls his arms behind his back to secure with handcuffs, and then tugs his head back enough to tie not only a blindfold over his eyes, but to shove a cloth gag into the poor boy’s mouth. The entire transaction takes only a couple of minutes at most, and then before Zane knows it, his friend is being pulled out of the room, and out of sight.

An anxiety grips Zane as the next moments stretch out as if for eternity. Where is the man taking Jay? Is his friend alright? Oh, of course he’s not alright, look at the situation he’s in! In an attempt to ease his anxiety, Zane goes over the footage from the last few minutes and – with paper and a pencil from the table in front of him – begins to sketch out what he could make out of the figure with calculated accuracy. Of course there are hardly any details he could truly make out, but he was able to figure out the man’s height along with an estimated weight and body type merely from the footage by using reference points such as Jay’s size and the door.

The silence and absence of any life in the monitored room stretches onward, but finally some people – three people, to be exact – re-enter the room. A light turns on, which forces the camera to switch out of night vision, but this is clearly a blessing, because the only masks these people are wearing are filtration facemasks. It makes sense, considering each of them carries a large bucket of various cleaning supplies, including bleach and other odorous disinfectants.

_ Immediately_, Zane begins to sketch every little detail that he can make out of each of their faces and bodies in proportion to the man he saw before, all the while his facial recognition systems work intensely in an attempt to identify them. One of the people in this room, the second to enter, shares the exact same height and body type as the man who took Jay, so Zane feels confident being able to connect the two as the same person. His circuits twinge at the feeling of helplessness he gets from watching even such a mundane thing as cleaning a room – he’s so close to figuring something out here and he can _see _this happening but until he can find where this operation is taking place, he can’t do anything that matters. It hurts, if he has to be honest, not being able to help his friend, who cannot help himself.

The sketches are done – perfectly detailed and he even begins to draw them from the back, but by the time he finishes the back sketch of only the first person, they are leaving the room. It’s far cleaner now, not that it matters, because it’s obvious what they are doing. The thought makes Zane feel sick, if nindroids can even get sick. The lights shut off and the camera switches back into the night vision filter. Thankfully, it doesn’t take as long for Jay to be brought back to the room, though he’s still unconscious. The wound on his head appears to be sewn up and his face cleaned, because it’s no longer dark and smudgy. The same cannot be said about his clothes, which are practically in tatters by now, and black within the night vision. Zane can only imagine the dark purple shade they truly take, and it churns his gears as if they are a stomach about to spill its contents.

He stops watching the stream without pausing the recording, and grips the papers with the sketches tightly without wrinkling them. He stands from where he sits within the galley and rushes his way outside to where the others train. They all immediately look up at him, hope and concern on their faces.

“I have the faces of people who are involved,” he declares, presenting the papers to the team who have all rushed over. He hands the three pages of sketches to Cole, Lloyd and Nya, who shows the sketch she holds with Kai. “I plan to scan the faces in my own facial recognition system but I also wish to take these to the police, as they have far many more people within their systems than I do. If one of you wish to accompany me, your presence would be much appreciated.”

Cole quickly steps forward as an offer, his solemn face flashing _genuine_ hope for the first time in months. “I’ll go with you.” Zane gives a curt, yet thankful nod to the master of Earth.

“Thank you, Cole. I would like to leave as soon as possible, if that will work for you. As for you, Lloyd, Kai and Nya, you should continue training. If this proves successful, we may be needed shortly.” Despite the dark situation behind this, Zane sounds hopeful, giddy even, that they are coming so much closer to finding their friend.

“I just gotta take a quick shower and we can go,” Cole says, slipping past his nindroid friend and passing back the piece of paper he’d been given. Zane nods again, and thanks Cole before he disappears inside to head to the _Bounty’s _bathroom. He also thanks Nya and Lloyd when they handed back the other two sheets of paper and then gently shoos them off to continue training.

He stays to watch them begin training again only for a few minutes, but he knows that he should be getting himself ready as well. He starts by finding an envelope to place the papers in and – with the newly sealed envelope tucked under his arm – heads toward the bunks to get changed into something a little more appropriate to roaming the streets in.

The envelope stays on his bed while he swiftly changes from the T-shirt and slacks into a nicer pair of pants with a sweater vest – one with inside pockets for him to place the parcel in without much risk of losing or damaging it. The First Spinjitzu Master knows how important these sketches are, and he would do anything to prevent something from damaging them.

The sound of the running shower shuts off, and Zane takes note of the time. It has already been 15 minutes since he stepped inside after Cole, and he notes with a bitter scorn that the time is going by too quickly. Of course, he knows that the police station never closes for safety and accessibility reasons, but it’s already four-thirty in the afternoon and the sun will be going down soon. He’d rather not walk around the city in the dark if he can help it.

Stepping out of the shared bedroom, he passes by Cole who ducks into the room awkwardly to get dressed and closes the door behind him. It’s a good thing that Zane doesn’t need to shower, he doesn’t want to waste any more time. “Meet me on the deck once you are dressed, Cole,” he calls through the door, and only leaves once he hears the familiar hum of acknowledgement from his teammate.

Of course Nya, Lloyd and Kai are still training once he exits the bridge onto the deck, but Kai takes a moment to glance up to greet him, which allows Nya – who he is sparring with – to land a solid kick to his chest and throw him back by a few feet. He lands on his ass with a grunt, and takes a leisurely moment to hoist himself back onto his feet.

“You must not allow yourself to get distracted,” Zane amuses, a slight smile tugging at his lips when Kai’s face turns red with frustration and embarrassment. However, before he can say anything, Cole steps out onto the deck and approaches Zane.

“Are you ready to go?” With the nindroid’s nod, the black and white duo approach the edge of the flying ship and climb over the railing to jump, preparing to summon their elemental dragons to catch them on their fall.

Zane hardly has to brace himself, but he can see the fear flicker in Cole’s eyes at the sight of the height beneath them. He reaches a hand out for the master of Earth to take, and he accepts. Together, they fall.

The wind whips past them as the two begin their descent towards the earth, and Zane can feel Cole’s hand tighten around his own. He squeezes back reassuringly – they have plenty of distance to get to the ground. He wants to make sure that his friend will be able to catch himself with his dragon, and attempts to reassure him. After a moment, Cole’s grip loosens, and gradually releases as he splits off to summon his own dragon successfully. Zane is not far behind, and together they head off towards the silhouette of Ninjago City in the distance.

Now that they’re not freefalling, the journey to the city is far more peaceful for the both of them, but it is far too short. It’s easy to forget that air travel is much faster than to travel by land, and the two ninja have reached the street of the Ninjago City police in barely any time. They desummon their dragons and roll in the street to a comfortable stop. Cole helps pull Zane to his feet before brushing off his own clothes. Zane does the same, and then they both start heading towards the police station. A silence hangs between them as the realization sinks in again about what they’re here for, and even if it’s for a lead in the case they’re so desperate to solve, it’s still a bleak reason.

The front desk receptionist looks up at the sound of the door opening, and she seems surprised and concerned at the appearance of the well-known ninja. “Hello,” she stammers, struggling to gather herself. “How may I help y-“

“We’re here to see the Commissioner, is he in today?”

“Oh,” says the receptionist. “I believe so, let me give him a call.” She leans back in her chair and pulls a phone from its holder, dialing an extension number on the main line. It only takes a few seconds for someone to pick up the other end.

They only hear one side of the conversation, but it seems to be a quick one before the receptionist slaps the phone back into place with an easy grin. “He should be waiting up in his office. I assume you know where it is?”

“Indeed. Thank you.”

“Any time.”

The duo approach the elevator to the left of the main floor. The lift takes a few moments to get down to the ground floor and open the doors, but the silence and wait isn’t awkward, and neither is the time it takes to get up to the top floor, where the Commissioner’s office is. When the elevator doors slide open, Zane and Cole step into the hall and towards office together, and it’s Zane who knocks on the door. A moment passes and there’s a gruff invitation from the other side. Once the pair steps inside, the Commissioner looks up from his model ship, and sets down the wood glue and loose piece that he was holding up and getting ready to attach to the body of the model.

“Hello, Zane,” he greets simply, leaning back in his chair from his forward leaning position. “Have you got anything for us regarding your friend?”

“I do,” says Zane with an unwavering confidence. “I have been monitoring the stream from the websites I emailed to you the other day nonstop and I have gathered evidence to further the investigation.” He pulls out the envelope and sets it on the desk, away from the model boat so not to disturb it. The Commissioner picks it up and opens it, a surprised hum coming from his throat while he inspects the sketches within.

“I assume these are-“

“People who are part of the kidnapping. This man,” Zane says, pulling the pages down in the Commissioner’s hands and pointing to the male in the center sheet. “May be the one in charge, but that could be inaccurate. I just know that I saw him attacking Jay and taking him from the room before coming back with the other two to clean.” The Commissioner nods and sets the papers back down, spreading them out on the desk where he can get a closer look at them all at once. “I would like these sketches to be run through a facial recognition program. If even one of them can be identified and apprehended, we may have a significant lead on the case.”

“Very well, I’ll have these filed and scanned and run through the facial database in hope of finding a match. I’ll call you if anything comes up.”

Zane nods with a grateful smile to the Commissioner, and gives him their thanks. “I will be looking forward to your call, sir.” With nothing else to say, and the conversation concluded, Cole and Zane shuffle back into the hall and towards the elevator. The time is five-fifteen, and it’s time to go home to rest.


	3. Blame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cole blames himself.

A pounding headache greets Jay upon his wake. In a near immediate response to the pain, he groans and reaches up a hand to rub at his forehead but recoils at the sting and tug that comes from it. This pain is far more physical than the headache, and pulls a whimper from him and makes him tear up until the stinging fades. The sharp pain almost leaves him breathless and dizzy. It doesn’t surprise him considering he hasn’t felt much that actually meant anything to him in a while. Once the feeling begins to fade, he lifts his hand again and feels at his forehead with a far gentler touch. The sting returns, but it’s bearable this time as he feels at the stitches. They must be closing up the wound left from being hit over the head. He pulls his fingers away and sniffs at them, smelling the blood that coats the tips. He wipes it off on his already blood-stained clothes with a dissatisfied hum. As the scent of blood weens, it’s quickly replaced by the familiar and godawful aroma of powerful cleaning chemicals. It makes him dizzy and hurts his head more, even after he hangs his mouth open to avoid breathing through his nose. Of course, the mouth breathing helps a little, but it doesn’t stop the scent of the chemicals from reaching him through his taste buds.

Realizing that he isn’t going to win this battle against his migraine, he leans back against the padded wall with a huff and stares blankly at the ceiling. Other than the exception of the “bathroom” equipment, the ceiling is the only part of the room that isn’t padded. It’s also far too high for him to reach – another downside to being short that he’s never thought too much about until now. With a dark and bitter thought, he runs through his head all the possible ways he could get himself out of this situation if he were able to reach the ceiling. A salty taste floods his mouth at the chilling thoughts, and he only just now realizes how dry his mouth is. He glances towards the door, hoping to find a tray of food and water there, and is relieved to see the vague shape of the standing water bottle against the darkened white of the padded wall behind it. It takes him a moment, but he manages to crawl his way over to the tray and pick up the bottle of water, which he quickly unscrews the cap of and sucks dry of the contents within. It doesn’t do much to quench his thirst as a whole, but it helps make his head less dizzy despite not being able to breathe while drinking.

Despite his thirst, he isn’t hungry, and glances at the bread and unbuttered, unseasoned potatoes that’s laid out on the tray by the door, and decides he’ll save the meal for later. He drags it away from the door and into the adjacent corner with the cot. The cot is where he piles his food stash and trash, since he doesn’t use it to sleep. He sets the tray on the edge where it’d be away from the rotting scraps and easy to reach. He can eat later, but for now, he’s going to try to sleep this neuralgia away.

Sleep doesn’t come easy, but it comes eventually.

**~** **♡** **~**

The wooden floor boards creak heavily beneath Cole’s weight, as he doesn’t care to mind his step as he drags himself out of bed and away from the bunks. On his way out of the room, he stops and glances back to the empty and untouched bunk across the room from his own. An icy bullet lodges itself in his heart and causes him to choke on his own breath.

The bed hadn’t been touched since a week after Jay’s disappearance: Zane had washed the sheets and made the bed to be neat for when they finally found Jay and brought him back to the _Bounty_. The old stuffed horse-like thing that Jay slept with, Mr. Cuddlywump, sits up against the pillow, slumped over and looking sad. With hardly a thought to it, Cole approaches the bed, careful not to wake Zane who “sleeps” in the bunk above Jay’s empty bed, and picks up the aged toy. The blue fabric is worn and stained and it has odd stitching all over its body and he feels a pang once he remembers that he’s the reason why it needed to be sewn up. He resists the urge to squeeze it, knowing that the squeaky toy inside would surely wake the others. Instead, he takes it on his way out, and heads up to the deck.

Nya’s presence on the deck doesn’t surprise him – she had taken the night shift, after all - although she usually spends her nights in the bridge, which _is_ what surprises him. She stands at the edge of the deck, leaning against the railing and peering over the edge to the land far below. She doesn’t notice him yet; instead, she appears lost in thought, a frown and furrowed brows adorning her face. Slowly, he approaches her, and only when his step causes the wood to creak does she look up.

“Cole? What are-“ She cuts herself off briefly as her eyes catch sight of the plush toy clutched in Cole’s hands. With a slight cough, she swiftly continues. “What are you doing up?”

“Can’t sleep,” is his answer, as he lowers himself to take a seat on the edge of the ship; he rests his head on the top of the railing and hangs his legs through the railing columns and over the side. He holds Mr. Cuddlywump tightly to his chest, but not too tight that it’ll make a sound.

With a gentle sigh, Nya takes a seat beside her fellow ninja, resting her arms on the railing and nuzzling into her own elbows. “I hope the police find something soon, we’re so close to getting a significant lead and it feels like we’re holding our breath to slowly suffocate until something comes up. I don’t know if I can wait much longer.”

“Me neither.” Nya glances up at the shaky response she receives and her eyes widen for a moment in surprise when she sees Cole hugging the toy to his face with tears in his eyes. “He probably thinks I hate him. The last time we saw each other we had a big fight and we hadn’t had a chance to resolve it, even into the next day.”

Nya’s arms wrap around him in a comforting manner, and suddenly everything Cole has pent up over the last few months during Jay’s absence spills. He pushes away from the railing and leans into the embrace to cry, squeezing at the toy in his hands in a feeble attempt to ground himself. It doesn’t do much, and the comedic squeaking from the compressions doesn’t help one bit, but the feeling of the soft and loved fabric in his hands does a little to keep his head from spinning.

Cole is a silent crier; even when he completely loses himself like this, he hardly makes any noise beyond an insignificant whimper here and there. Years of brutal mental conditioning from his father had ingrained it into his head that he _can’t_ cry, but he can’t _not_ cry either, so he cries _silently_. Even after being on the team for so long and finally seeing that it’s okay to cry and to be loud about it, it’s impossible for him to rewrite that emotional programming. Nobody blames him.

“I’m scared,” he starts, barely able to choke the words out, but after he finally manages, the dam breaks. “What if we never see Jay again- what if we fail, and never see him again and his last memory of me is our fight and forcing him to leave the _Bounty_ when he didn’t want to? I know he thinks I hate him and I hate knowing that, he’s my best friend and I’d do anything to be able to see him again and tell him I’m sorry-“

Cole’s mind is a mess and so are his words, slurred and quiet while his panic saps his already minimal energy. Nya doesn’t interrupt his rambling, even as he begins to repeat himself over and over; she just lets him cry and he appreciates that more than anything in this moment. It makes his heart swell because he knows he’s cared about. Nya runs her hands through his hair and rubs his back in gentle circles, humming a gentle tune she knows soothes the Master of Earth into his ear.

It takes a long while, but Cole’s blabbering finally settles down and his shaky and uneven breathing eventually calms, only interrupted by an occasional hiccup here and there. He still shakes in her arms, but unfortunately there isn’t much to do about that. His energy had been entirely sapped by the breakdown, and he doesn’t have the energy to relax his tense and trembling muscles even into sleep. Cole is heavy and difficult to lift but Nya manages to get him up, despite the massive size difference between them; she’s always been one of the physically strongest on the team aside from Cole himself, and Zane, so it’s not really a surprise that she manages, but it’s still a bit of a breath-taker to lift up the heavy, sleeping man.

On unconfident but determined legs, Nya pulls the both of them inside and heads towards the boys’ bunks. She’s careful not to make too much noise or any sudden movements while she pushes inside and slides Cole off of her and onto his own bed. He’s barely conscious when he hums and Nya shushes him back to sleep.

**~** **♡** **~**

The week following Zane’s lead has been incredibly slow. Unbearably so. Zane hasn’t reported any new information and the police have not gotten back to the ninja team, either. There has hardly even been any trouble in Ninjago for them to deal with – only petty thievery here and there that had already been taken care of by the time one of the team had arrived on the scene. The hours drag and it doesn’t seem like time can pass any more slowly for any of them.

Cole has only gotten worse within the week. Even during the last couple of months, his health hasn’t deteriorated as fast as it has this week. Unless he’s sent out to take care of a minor call or training (they are _always _training. Why are they always training, when they can be looking for Jay instead?), he has some sort of baked sweet on him. A slice or two of rich, chocolate cake is a common companion of his in this week. He’s spent more money on cake in this week than he has in the last few months, and that says a lot.

It’s affecting his mental health, too. He constantly feels heavy and hopeless, and he often has to force himself to avoid the ninjas’ shared room during the day so he won’t lay down to sleep the pain away. He’s not physically tired, but the thought that they can be _so close _yet _so far _from finding Jay is taxing on his soul. He finds it hard to think about anything other than his best friend and the ache in his soul that Jay’s absence causes him. Every time he closes his eyes or stands in silence for more than a moment, the only thing he can think to see or hear is the night before Jay’s disappearance.

_ Cole sits awake in his bed, reading lamp turned on and propped over his shoulder while he draws in one of his many sketchbooks. He’s not drawing anything – or anyone – in particular, as he’s only practicing his figure drawing despite being able to do it with his eyes closed by now. He looks up when the creaky door opens, and he sighs when he sees Jay, huddled in on himself and shaking, his blue eyes looking distant and haunted. He’s been like this for the last couple of weeks. He seems surprised to see Cole in bed so early, and almost steps out of the room on instinct, but decides against it. Instead, he stalks silently over to his own bed and sits down, but he doesn’t lay down._

_ “I know you don’t believe me,” he begins, voice soft with the same fear that’s laced it for weeks now. “…but I’m sure I saw them again when I was out with Nya earlier.”_

He can only think of the desperation in his voice and how Cole dismissed him and called him silly, and even suggested getting him “help” if he couldn’t calm his nerves. Look where this all got him. If Cole had listened, if he’d been a good friend, none of this would be happening.

_ “You went out to the City Park, right?” Jay swallows thickly and nods to Cole’s question. “It was probably some passerby. You seriously need to stop worrying so much, it’s unhealthy.”_

_ “They wouldn’t stop looking at me.”_

_ “I don’t know, dude. They might have just recognized you or something. You’re being ridiculous.”_

Another pang of guilt flashes through Cole’s chest when he remembers the look on Jay’s face that followed his words. Utter betrayal, disbelief, and anger covered the boy’s face and Cole knows that it was his fault, _his _fault that Jay felt so betrayed. He probably still feels that way.

The argument continues in Cole’s head, until the shrill sound of Jay’s panicked voice gives him a headache and makes him want to cry. Jay stormed out of the room and took the night shift in place of Lloyd that night, and avoided Cole into the next day, even once the team forced him off of the Bounty to go into the city with them. It’s because of his avoidance that he was able to get away from the group and disappear.

It’s entirely Cole’s fault, he knows it is, but he still hates to think about it. When they get Jay back – _if _they get Jay back – will he even forgive his old friend? The more he thinks about it, the more Cole convinces himself that he’s irredeemable to Jay, and it pains him.


End file.
